Jackie Robinson West coach Darold Butler consoles Brandon Green after he was removed from the mound during the sixth inning of the Little League World Series championship game against South Korea in South Williamsport, Pa., on Aug. 24, 2014.

Jackie Robinson West coach Darold Butler consoles Brandon Green after he was removed from the mound during the sixth inning of the Little League World Series championship game against South Korea in South Williamsport, Pa., on Aug. 24, 2014.

"That's a lesson that starts before today, about being humble and how you treat other people," said Hondras' stepmom, Sharee Hondras. "I think they have the foundation, and these kids are here having fun, and basically just playing baseball.

"Their parents laid the foundation early on. Trey is a grounded kid. As long as he continues to be that kid, he'll be OK. They'll all be OK."

Few expected the team to get this far after losing a week ago to Nevada and having to survive four elimination games to face South Korea.

So even though some were crying afterward, the tears dried quickly and everyone was smiling by the time the kids began playing together an hour afterward.

"We feel good," outfielder DJ Butler said. "We're champions."

The South Korean team beat the Chicagoans at their own game, with aggressive baserunning and a late-inning offensive outburst. But the Chicago kids showed great sportsmanship, as when pitcher Brandon Green apologized to a South Korean player for hitting him with a pitch.

"That's the part people don't see," assistant coach Jason Little said. "We're in the same dorm — the U.S, Australia, Canada and the West. They were just playing with the kids until midnight, and then had to shut it down. The game is the game, but up there in the dorms, it's all fun."

Manager Darold Butler said the experience was something that could never be replicated, and everyone got the most out of it, including the adults.

"It's something that's unreal for them, and me being a kid that played Little League as an 11-, 12-year-old, it's unreal for me too," he said. "I'm just enjoying the moment and making sure I get everything out of it that I wished I could have gotten when I was one of these kids."

Butler will go back to his job as an engineer at Union Pacific, and Little will go back to running a Harold's Chicken Shack he owns at 79th Street and Western Avenue, hoping to fade back to obscurity.

"This is not real," Little said. "We're celebrities here. Chicago is a big place. When I take this jersey off, I'll just be another guy in Chicago. Today is the happiest day for me, because I know tomorrow I'll be sleeping in my bed."

As for the kids, they have more dreams to chase, and hopefully they'll get a chance to have many more successes in their lives. Some of the more talented players, like Trey Hondras, may go on to high school and college ball. Others will go in different directions.

"One day at a time, and we hope Trey can be successful whatever he (does)," said Carlton Hondras, Trey's father. "That's what we preach to everyone of these kids — just have fun and try to push yourself to be successful as you can in whatever it is you want to do in life."

No matter what happens the rest of their lives, they'll always have the U.S. championship, and the summer they owned Chicago. They'll be remembered as the team that would not quit, a story that played out until the last out Sunday.

"Our team never gives up," Trey said. "You'll never see us give up until the end of the game. We kept fighting and fighting until the game was over."

The Jackie Robinson West All-Stars may have lost a game, but they won a million hearts, and that's really all that matters.

When the late-inning rally you knew the Jackie Robinson West players had in them fell just short Sunday in an 8-4 defeat to South Korea in the Little League World Series final, everybody at the watch party on the Far South Side immediately rose to their feet.

SOUTH WILLIAMSPORT, Pa. — Gregson Smith and his family, outfitted in gold Great Lakes region shirts and hats, parked themselves in lawn chairs on the famous hill beyond right field at Lamade Stadium two hours before Sunday's Little League Baseball World Series championship game.

Chicago's love affair with the U.S. champion Jackie Robinson West All-Stars Little League team will continue Wednesday with a welcome home rally and parade that will start on the Far South Side and wind north to Millennium Park.